Matt Lococo: Title III funding
The recent freezing of funds and passing of the Big Beautiful Bill has been hailed as some of the best actions ever taken by an administration. I want to preface the next few paragraphs by saying that I am a Republican. I voted for Trump. I put his sign in my yard (both times), and I defended him in some very narrow circles. I say all of that to say that I think he and his administration, under the guise of saving taxpayer money and eliminating the waste of the federal government, have crossed—hell, burned—a bridge that will be hard to put back together.
On July 1, a letter was sent to each state notifying them that the federal government—more specifically, the executive branch—had instructed the Department of Education to freeze funds and conduct a full audit before the funds are released, if they are at all. There was no timeline for this; there was no reason other than they wanted to ensure that they aligned with the president’s goals for the department. While I applaud the efforts to reduce government spending, these actions—at least as of late—have impacts that I don’t know if those in charge didn’t think about or didn’t care about, but at the same time, they have some damaging impacts.
One of these funds that was frozen is what is called Title III funding. In educationese, we like to use titles to designate different money that is used. For those that don’t know, school districts operate basically on a three-fund platform. They receive local money, which is allocated in North Carolina by each board of commissioners for each county. They receive state funds, which make up the majority of the funding that our schools receive. This covers everything from buses to teacher salaries—this is where most of the money sits. Then there are federal funds. This makes up less than 15% of funding for schools. While that seems low, each of the federal funds is designated and can only be used for what they are designated for, basically locking in those funds to specific purposes. So when you freeze one of those funds, you impact different parts of the district.
Title III, that I referenced, is a fund that is designated for English as a Second Language instruction. These funds are what fund ESL instruction, resources, and assistance for those students who come to us having indicated on a home language survey that English was not the first language learned in the home. These students are often immigrants (legal or illegal—not my job to judge that, they come, we teach them), students who have parents that are immigrant or migrant workers, and supplies/training for teachers. In rural areas of North Carolina, including our area, ESL or multi-language learners make up 30–40% of the student population. That means the funding designated to assist these students with acquiring skills in English has been completely removed from the funding equation until the Department of Education decides what to do. Now I don’t really care where you stand on the immigration debate—I see the faces of these children every day. Most of them didn’t choose the life that they have or the story of how they got here. Instead, it was chosen for them. Children don’t make huge life choices, and as adults, it's our responsibility to help them. But when politics—and dare I say hatred—enter the conversation, they are the ones that are impacted.
With Title III, Title II, and the 21st Century Learning Center funding freeze, the same administration who said that none of the funding would directly impact individuals is holding up, according to the attorney general of North Carolina, close to $12 million in funding for counties in the Southeast DPI Region (Greene County, Lenoir County, and Jones County are part of this region). Those funds impact the ability of districts—who are already struggling to staff buildings, pay for supplies, and plan for anything (thanks to our state legislature who, for the who-how-many-times, failed to deliver a state budget on the statutorily required date of July 1)—to have an idea of where to go with their school year.
All of these funding sources directly impact students from all walks of life. The 21st Century Learning Center funds are the ones that support things like Boys and Girls Clubs, afterschool food and tutoring programs, and extracurricular activities/summer camps for students. So there you go again, directly impacting children. There are no funds to replace this money, so if they are eliminated, those programs are gone. If we lived in a region that was ripe with options for parents, this wouldn’t seem so alarming. But take a look around the Neuse River Valley—there are not a lot of options for parents for their kids after school or for tutoring.
Title II is funds that are provided to support teacher development. As I write this, North Carolina is facing a teaching shortage the likes of which we have not seen in decades. ECU, which was started as the North Carolina Teaching College, produced one of the smallest classes of new teachers in its history over the past few years. That leaves districts looking outside of education programs for teachers, and Title II is what is used to provide training and development for non-traditional teachers. Our legislatures at both the state and federal level like to scream about the ineffectiveness of the teacher training programs and that we should just allow anyone with a degree to teach to fill these slots. The reality is that there is no incentive to become a teacher—especially here in North Carolina. Our salary is well below the market value, and the small golden coins of lifetime benefits are gone for new teachers. You can’t keep expecting things to improve when you don’t have the resources to make it happen.
I’ll close with this: as an educator with 20 years of experience, all in public schools, I am worried about the future of education. Some of my friends on the left will say this is a result of things like the Opportunity Scholarship, but I strongly disagree. All four of my children attend private school in Lenoir County. All four of them receive the Opportunity Scholarship. That may leave you saying, “How can he argue about education funding?” Well, I believe that the OSP is good for education. If fully funded public schools and schools funded with OSP dollars are operating at the same time, it creates competition. Competition is good for all sectors of the economy, and education is no different. The problem isn’t in parents choosing what's best for their children; it lies in legislators and politicians who have no idea what it takes to operate a school that has to meet the standards, unfunded mandates, and requirements that are put in place by a state and federal government that have in some ways targeted them. Eventually, the ability for schools to function will be impacted—and we are beginning to see that now. The federal government has no place in our education system constitutionally, but they do have the responsibility to release the funds that were congressionally approved before districts have to make decisions between programs for kids or the very people that are in our classrooms.
I implore you to reach out to your congressman and other elected officials and encourage them to contact the Department of Education and resolve this before it truly has impacts on those that are most vulnerable—our kids. Agree or disagree, that’s just my view from inside the trenches.
The opinions expressed in this column do in no way reflect the opinions of any school system or Board of Education, they are simply the author's.
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